One of the pleasures of this editorial chair (and the other chairs in the Stylophiles office, of course), aside from pruning and strewing commas and semicolons happily from our Punctuation Basket ™ (except the other chairs don't get to mess with the PB), is getting to see stuff we can't talk about. Even though writing about pens doesn't exactly qualify as journalism, we still are privy to "in" knowledge and gossip-and we get to see products in the idea, development, and prototype stages, which is a lot of fun.

Not long ago, a few of those early-stage pens landed on our desk. Well, actually it was our lunch table and they were carried in a pen folder, but we quickly cleared the plates and stuff out of the way to get to the important things.

One was a pen that was so enormous it would have made a Waterman 20, which is actually only six and a quarter inches in length (but eight and three-quarters, posted) look like a common 52. Huge, it was; at least eight or nine inches long and close to an inch in diameter (though the section slimmed down to something more manageable). We didn't have a measuring instrument handy, so couldn't do more than guess, but it was an enormous honker, with a specially made nib to match. "Truncheon" comes to mind as an appropriate descriptor.

It also had a perfectly lovely hand-tooled sterling silver overlay on cap and barrel. This was the kind of pen that you use to impress people. When they walk into your office (if you owned a pen like this, everyone would come to you, not vice versa) and whip out their Mont Blanc Skeleton to sign a contract, you smirk, arch your eyebrow, and lift this baby from its shrine on your desk. "That's not a pen," says your smirk, "this is a pen!" Then you call the paramedics to revive your visitor.

At the other end of the spectrum was a solid 18K gold pen, nearly all of which was dressed in a glossy, understated black enamel. Though you couldn't see the gold, you could certainly feel its heft, and the person who uses this pen has so much confidence (or so much money) that, while he or she is using an $18,000 pen, it's utterly unimportant whether you know it or not. An interesting contrast in purchasing psychology, no?

We also got to see one of the faux S.T. Dupont pens we wrote about last month. These pens are so nicely made that it seems inappropriate to use the word "fake" to describe them, though that's what they are. Had we not known, we'd have thought they were the real deal; and even noting the non-Dupont-style feed, we'd have thought, "Hmm, they must be using a new type of feed." So watch out for that one (and re-read the article before you buy a Dupont, unless you know the dealer).

Now that we've teased you with stories we can't tell, we'll send you on your way to enjoy the stories we can tell in this month's issue. Have fun!